Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / #2: Gill1918 presents Steven Thompson "Chained Resisted Sprinting and Jumping"

Transcript

#2: Gill1918 presents Steven Thompson "Chained Resisted Sprinting and Jumping" · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

• 0:00
  Welcome to the Gill 1918 Project, a podcast series by
• 0:03
  coaches, for coaches powered by Gill Athletics.
• 0:06
  Think of this as the Ted Talks of track and field coaching.
• 0:09
  Short, insightful, and packed with valuable strategies to help
• 0:12
  you grow as a coach. We'll bring in the once a year
• 0:15
  track clinic straight to your ears daily.
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  Interested in creating your own episode?
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  Everyone's welcome to participate.
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  Check out the show notes below For more information.
• 0:23
  Now let's get into today's topic.
• 0:27
  Hey guys, this is Steven Thompson.
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  I have the Voodoo Power Gym just South of Kansas City, about an
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  hour. I'm very honored that I was
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  asked to participate in this Guild 1918 podcast for
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  additional education or best strategies practices.
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  Quite the honor for somebody like me that's not necessarily
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  in the professional ranks, but working with youth athletes.
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  The topic I was going to go over today was a chain resisted
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  sprinting and jumping. Well, I use the title chain.
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  It doesn't necessarily have to be chained.
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  It it should be probably more weight resisted sprinting and
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  jumping. It's something we've implemented
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  here at the gym. I've seen the benefits of it.
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  I've seen how it's helped young athletes and it it's something
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  that I think I can talk about with a little bit of knowledge
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  and and background. The population I have is a high
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  school to junior high aged athlete.
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  So you know, when the younger side, they're really working
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  through their body and trying to figure out what they want to do.
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  On the older side, they're starting to get ready to think
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  about moving on to the next level.
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  And, and hopefully these things that we've implemented will
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  serve them well as they move on into whatever endeavors and
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  athletics they're going to pursue.
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  The idea that athletes, especially young ones, can
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  create power is a little bit of a stretch.
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  If you watch a younger athlete, and, and I'm sure most of you
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  guys know, they just don't know how to get into the ground, how
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  to propel themselves, how to figure out where the force is
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  coming from. It's it's a natural ability they
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  have that they use. And for the most part, if if
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  they don't meet a coach that can bring that out in them, that's
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  where they're going to end up for the rest of their career.
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  Now, maybe they're an athlete that that is fine with that and
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  they're so talented that it doesn't matter, but in a lot of
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  instances they're not and they need to find that next little
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  bit to kind of take them over the edge.
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  So like I said, the athletes I'm I'm around or anywhere from
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  junior high to high school. And some are fast, they can be
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  quicker and saying that and the others just take on this idea
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  that I'm not fast. That's just what they learn to
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  live with. They they picture themselves as
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  slow and that's just what God give them.
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  Is that true? Is it not?
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  There's always going to be a raging debate over can you build
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  speed? To a certain extent I would say
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  you probably can't. But in another extent, you can
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  definitely help with the attributes that will help them
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  to be successful in finding their speed, whatever that may
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  be. I mean, when you talk to them,
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  even at a senior level in high school, a lot of these a lot of
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  these athletes, they're just clueless at what the Sprint or
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  jump requires of their body and how they need to prepare to get
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  there. If you ask a lot of them, you
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  know, even a short of a race as a 60, the phases of the race
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  seem to elude them. It's just they've been told
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  their whole life to to run fast. And I guess years of evolution
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  have kind of built on that. How often, I guess maybe as we
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  were coming up being chased by woolly mammoths or whatever the
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  case may be, that you thought about the acceleration phase,
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  the turnover phase and a top speed phase and hoping you
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  didn't de sell in time to get ran over or have a Tusk run
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  through you. So we've just learned just go
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  fast and the fastest one wins. You start getting into the
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  hundreds and the two hundreds and that really starts changing
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  how that looks. You can only go fast for so
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  long. So how do you show your your top
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  speed and the best light possible?
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  So as I'm going through my notes here, trying not to get lost
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  with what I have, teaching them to apply pressure in the ground
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  and to get moving seems to be a crucial step in building them.
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  We'll spend a little bit of time on the whiteboard and we'll talk
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  about what what we want to see, what we want to coach as far as
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  a first step, acceleration, moving into a turnover, into a
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  top speed. But that seems to only get the
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  picture started in their mind. Everything else has to be taken
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  to the track and with timer, something that proves that what
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  you're telling them is beneficial and that you're not
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  misleading them. For an athlete to think they
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  need to go a little slower in it to be fast doesn't make sense in
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  their head. It, it has to be proven through
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  the math of the timer. So I've worked with a lot of
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  different ideas on how, on how to implement this.
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  You know, I've walked through lateral bounds into a Sprint,
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  which I really like. I, I think it, I think it helps
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  if you can get them lateral bounding really well and then
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  get that turnover into a Sprint from there.
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  What I've noticed is a problem is they're only going to get
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  that one hard step in the ground and then they're off and going.
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  And it happens so fast that they may not even be able to, to
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  realize what happened. That moment's gone.
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  You can film it, show it back to them, but it takes a little bit
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  to understand what that one step feels like.
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  And then you have to carry that one step into two into three.
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  And to build on that, it just takes more time than what the
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  athlete can process. I think if we can slow it down a
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  little more, we can gain progress because they're going
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  to be in it longer, they can feel it longer, and the force it
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  takes to move the weight behind them creates a natural movement
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  that they can put into, they can put into use very quickly.
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  So I've also used the falling start or assisted falling start
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  in much the same way and and I haven't got away from those.
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  I will still use them. I just seem to use them more
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  after the resisted stuff because it seems like their effect is a
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  little more potent. These are the tool tools and
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  drills that we use. But from them I've moved up the
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  ladder a little bit and digging through some Louis Simmons stuff
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  in his Sprint book. It got me down this restricted
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  sprinting rabbit hole, force generation rabbit hole.
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  Well, that was just kind of planting a seed.
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  I didn't really know how to put that into effect.
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  So we're at, I did take this idea and and learn to implement
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  it was talking to some other guys and that opened up a whole
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  new world for me. Tony Vilani, he got into it a
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  little bit. I got to listen to him and using
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  timers and how much to slow him down South in the beginning
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  before I talk to Tony, we just started attaching chains to
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  everything and seeing what would happen.
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  You know, we were attaching them in the vertical jumps, in the
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  broad jumps. There's really no protocol for
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  weight or a great measurement system because you've got
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  different kids using kind of the same weight for time and that's
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  not always going to be the best means of creating the stimulus,
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  stimulus you want and let alone to track it, it, it was very
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  difficult. We were just hoping kids were
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  getting better. I'm sure they were, but there
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  was no way to prove that to them that they were.
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  So after talking to Tony, he had kind of opened up this idea of
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  timers like I'd mentioned. But how much do you slow them
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  down that that was kind of kind of the deal.
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  How much change do you put on them?
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  How much lead do you put on them that you're not distorting the
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  form, that you're not making it impossible for them to do and
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  that you are seeing kind of the benefits of what could possibly
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  be. How we kind of started doing
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  this was I used A5 yard space to time and I would set the athlete
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  up behind the timer so they weren't being timed on the
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  initial take off. The start position is
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  changeable. You can do whatever you want.
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  If you got a baseball player, you could do a 60 stance, you
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  got a softball player, you could do a falling start.
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  I use kneeling a lot. I don't know why I seem to have
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  kind of fallen on that. I think it creates big arm
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  movement to come out of that kneel and then the chains grab.
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  Quick falling start is also is one that that I use a lot that
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  I, I think seems to help them generate force.
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  But I'll let them run that 5 yard unresisted.
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  Let's just figure out what their time is.
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  We'll get a baseline. It might take a couple for the
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  athlete to feel like they ran a good one or for you to get an
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  average 'cause they may pop off a really good time and then
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  everything after that may be slow.
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  This will kind of give you an average of, of what you want to
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  see. Now, once, once you have that
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  number and you've established, let's say you know, in the five
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  yards it was 2 seconds. I want to slow them down 50%
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  more, whether you say that's 100 and 50% or whatever the case may
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  be. I, I wanted that to be a three
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  second time that'll that'll be the target that we're going for.
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  Now in doing that, I'm not going to try to attach enough chain
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  the next Sprint to get them to three second.
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  I want the build up because I feel like that build up is what
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  creates the force and they learn to accept it.
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  And as you keep adding change, trying to hit your mark, you'll
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  notice that those times are starting to get down to what
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  their original time was unresisted.
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  Once you kind of find the amount of chain it's going to take,
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  that first Rep is probably going to be distorted a little bit.
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  They're going to hit that chain. It's going to be way more weight
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  than probably what you have thinking they will pull to get
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  to that 50% more. The one Rep when you do find
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  it's going to be distorted. And while I've in the beginning,
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  I was like, oh, that's too much. When you stop there, I started
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  deciding, well, let's give them a second Rep and see what
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  happens. We can always come down.
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  Usually the second rep's clean and they'll bust off a good time
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  with that substantial amount of weight typically behind them.
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  So once you've established that, I'll let them take a couple reps
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  with that just so they learn how to get in the ground, how to
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  pull. It's amazing how their
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  acceleration form changes. It just comes right into what
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  you want to see. You can film it.
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  Then as you're going back through with the athlete, you
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  can show them unresisted and then you can show them resisted.
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  You can see the changes in the force being applied to the
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  ground. It also seems to help them get
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  in a body position that is closer to what you need because
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  to pull that weight, you have to be at the angle you need to be
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  to accelerate it Even so much stuff out very quickly that it's
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  something that I've been super happy with.
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  Now once I've removed the resistance, we'll get them set
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  up and they, and then they can go without it.
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  Now we're giving them plenty of rest here.
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  We want to see as much force as possible.
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  We want them to be recovered. We're we're not trying to
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  condition them. We're trying to have them be as
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  strong as possible in the time frame we need them.
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  So once we take the weight off, we'll line them back up in the
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  same same setup. And what you'll probably see is
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  that first Rep out-of-the-box, they're going to stumble,
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  whether it's just not being resisted anymore or applying
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  more force in the ground that they're not used to.
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  Whatever the case may be, that first Rep, they're going to
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  stumble and typically they'll still pop off a good time.
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  But once they know what's coming, you can line them back
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  up and then let them take a few more, take a few more sprints in
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  that and then video that so that you have 3 phases that you can
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  look at with the athlete and it as they're processing all that,
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  it'll just come into line. They'll be able to see the
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  difference. They'll be able to feel
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  stronger. They'll be in the ground a
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  little longer and the body position will be better.
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  For the younger athletes, it's going to take longer than your
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  more seasoned athletes, your more seasoned athletes will.
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  Their body awareness is so much higher.
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  They'll feel it. They'll go right into it and
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  then now you can add back the bounding into sprints or falling
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  starts. However you want to add that in.
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  They're more prepared for those drills.
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  So this idea led me to some other ideas and it started
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  making me wonder if I could improve jumpers lives by helping
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  with the acceleration. And it does seem in a horizontal
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  jump, it seems to help an incredible amount.
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  We kind of took that a little bit further into the high jump,
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  which I understand the high jump's a little more bouncy.
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  I, I get that coming into the bar on that J step, they're
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  going to be up more so than an acceleration phase.
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  But what I found out was if you set this up in a curve linear
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  situation, you can see really quickly if they are staying
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  forward through the curve when they hit that J, are they
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  drifting laterally to the bar? Are they coming over their
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  midline? And if you add weight, it
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  magnifies the issue they have. So if they're coming way across
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  the midline in that curve, you put some weight on it, then it
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  really gets to a point you can see they seem to lose that
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  forwardness where you may not have been able to see it without
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  the weight. So you add that weight to it,
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  they can hit that curve. You can start analyzing with
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  them how far over their midline are they stepping, how much are
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  they drifting to the pit, and then you can make that
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  adjustment from there. I'm not looking at them to try
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  to do anything jumping wise. I just want to get them
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  comfortable in the curve, put the weight on that holds them in
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  the curve longer where they can move forward through it.
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  Now, I've spent a lifetime working with horses and I always
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  end up tying this back into a podcast somehow.
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  Whether that's right, wrong, indifferent, I don't know, but
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  that is what I know. When you're working horses on
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  the ground, if you're around them, you may have noticed this.
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  If not, it may not make any sense to you.
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  But especially on a lead, if you're asking a horse to walk
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  past you, that first step they want to make will never be
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  forward. It'll always be across their off
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  foot. The inside foot will cross the
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  outside foot. That's not forward.
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  That is a lateral movement, the pursuit of getting straightness
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  through a horse. It's very much like the same as
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  it is in the athlete. Nobody had ever explained it to
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  me in a way that that horse was stepping across his midline and
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  I needed to get him forward. I just learned that you had to
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  keep setting them up straight and letting them feel it and
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  letting them find it. Taking that back.
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  The athletes that served me well, you can kind of coach it a
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  little bit, but they'll feel it. They'll feel it when they start
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  stepping across their midline. They'll feel it when they get
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  forward and they get straight and that body's going right down
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  the that foot's going right down the center of their body.
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  That correction comes pretty quick.
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  Then you can remove the chain. Now your step into the curve for
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  your J step should be a little more cleaner.
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  Younger athletes, obviously it's going to take take a while and
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  then when you introduce the bar for the jump that changes
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  everything. Right now I'm just talking about
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  the preparation to get them to move forward through the curve.
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  So that was that was a spot that that we have added and I've seen
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  quite a bit of improvement there, especially with younger
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  kids that just don't understand what needs to happen.
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  The last place that I've introduced chains is in
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  horizontal jumping. So we will set up the same
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  system as our Sprint and we will have them do a triple broad jump
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  unresisted. Let's figure out what the time
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  is and how many jumps it takes to cover whatever that distance
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  is. Now if you're working through
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  quite a few athletes, you're going to have to figure out what
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  allows the most kids to do this at one time.
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  So there may be a little give and take on how you set that up.
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  Timing is the same. We time from the start of the
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  1st jump to the end of the last jump.
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  Now we have a number. We will do it almost exactly the
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  same. 150% is what we want for the change.
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  We'll do a slow build up and we want to see what happens.
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  Does the time drop as we add chains?
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  Do they get a little more forceful?
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  Do they get a little bit more in the ground?
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  Now, like I said, in the sprinting, it's going to take a
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  lot more chain or weight than what you think to get them
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  slowed down to meet the mark that you have in your head.
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  Once you have your slow build up there, let them take that jump a
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  couple times with that weight, remove the chain, and then
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  you're going to let them go unresisted.
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  I've not seen miraculous improvements in all athletes,
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  but some of the improvements that I've seen that were pretty
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  astounding is the time will drop sometimes up to 3/10 of a second
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  and that distance, so you know they're getting out of the
• 17:38
  ground faster than they were before.
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  The biggest one I've seen is in your really springy athletes is
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  they will cut that jump down to two jumps.
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  Now that's pretty incredible. If you had a kid that was taken
• 17:51
  a certain distance in three jumps and they knocked a whole
• 17:54
  jump out of that, well then you know that the force, the hips,
• 17:57
  everything is coming through better and you are seeing the
• 18:01
  result that that you are hoping for to make it worth the time of
• 18:04
  finding the chain, setting up the timers and doing all that.
• 18:10
  This may be for you, it may not. There may, this may answer some
• 18:13
  questions that you have or how to set some stuff up or it may
• 18:16
  be something that really doesn't interest you.
• 18:20
  But on a private level, working with some athletes, especially
• 18:23
  ones that are really wanting to jump or wanting to Sprint and
• 18:27
  just cannot put together how to get in the ground.
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  I feel like chained or sled jumping, sprinting is definitely
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  the case for or definitely has made a case for improvements.
• 18:40
  So I know I stumbled through this a little bit.
• 18:44
  I appreciate you listening. It's, it's a little harder to do
• 18:46
  than what you might think to sit down to no guest on a podcast,
• 18:51
  just reading from some notes you had and, and carrying on a
• 18:54
  conversation that nobody's listening to at the time.
• 18:57
  So thank you very much for listening.
• 19:00
  I hope you get something out of this.
• 19:02
  I know at the end of the presentation, we were allowed to
• 19:06
  kind of plug a few things. So if I was going to plug
• 19:09
  something, I would plug the Voodoo Power podcast.
• 19:12
  That's a podcast I have with coaches from all over the
• 19:14
  country, private sector, high school, college, different
• 19:17
  aspects of training. We sit down with as many coaches
• 19:20
  as possible to try to set up a platform where where guys can
• 19:23
  learn. They can reach out to the coach
• 19:25
  that was on build a relationship, ask some questions
• 19:28
  about what they're doing. We all do so much in common, but
• 19:31
  it's the little things that kind of set us apart.
• 19:33
  So if we're highlighting that and talking about that, it does
• 19:37
  make a big difference in in how we coach our athletes.
• 19:42
  You can catch me on Instagram or Twitter.
• 19:44
  They're both voodoo for power. You can see some of our
• 19:47
  athletes, we're in a small town, so you'll see some of them out
• 19:51
  in a barn, you'll see some of them out in a pasture.
• 19:53
  We make do with what we have, but we are seeing some success
• 19:57
  in some of these these off ideas that we've implemented.
• 20:00
  So yeah, please check those outreach out to me on any of
• 20:03
  those. If you have any questions or
• 20:05
  maybe you agree, maybe you disagree, we can we can have
• 20:08
  that conversation as well. And then the last thing is, is I
• 20:11
  wrote a book a few years ago, it's called Stacking Losses.
• 20:13
  It's about a transactional coach and athlete and the relationship
• 20:17
  that. Transpires from that it's on
• 20:21
  Amazon more than happy to look look into that if you want.
• 20:25
  I want to thank Mike Cunningham for asking me to come on this.
• 20:28
  I I really did enjoy it. I put some notes together that I
• 20:32
  I hope we're fairly clean. I'm sure I'll go back and edit
• 20:34
  some of this, but thank you very much for keeping me in mind and
• 20:37
  allow me this platform to kind of share some of my ideas.
• 20:42
  Hey gang, Mike Cunningham here. Hey, I hope you enjoyed this
• 20:46
  episode of the Guild 1918 Project series.
• 20:49
  It's really my mission, my passion to bring you massive
• 20:52
  amounts of value and I hope this one hit the mark.
• 20:56
  The Guild 1918 Project is really dependent on you if for you to
• 21:01
  build your own episode, to hear your voice, to have your voice
• 21:04
  heard you have something to say and teach other coaches out
• 21:08
  there. So please get a hold of me,
• 21:10
  E-mail, text message, Twitter, smoke signals, get a hold of me
• 21:15
  and let's help create your episode of the Guild 1918
• 21:18
  Project. Hope you enjoy the day, they
• 21:19
  will see you tomorrow.